Rev. Canon Charles Gibbs has served as United Religion Initiative’s founding executive director for the past 16 years, from URI’s gestation to the present international network of more than 500 cooperation circles in 78 countries. Charles has worked with religious, spiritual and other leaders in Europe, Africa, the Middle East, the Americas, Asia and the Pacific, been a featured speaker internationally, and written extensively about interfaith cooperation. With colleague Sally Mahé, he co-authored Birth of a Global Community (2003), a book on the birth of the United Religions Initiative. His essay “Opening the Dream: Beyond the Limits of Otherness” appears in the anthology, Deepening the American Dream. As an Episcopal priest, Charles brings to his work a strong commitment to spiritual transformation and to work for peace, justice and healing, as well as an abiding belief in the sacredness of all life on this planet.